Tombstone Tuesday- New Leads Galore!

The larger grave (no. 48), is Shmuel's!

Much excitement today: for today I have found my first ever Eastern European tombstone! I can hardly contain my joy- I've been jumping up and down shouting at my much confused non-genealogist friends, and ringing or emailing just about everyone I'm related to! A few hours I discovered not just the details, but even an image of my great-great-great-grandfather Shmuel Stern's matzevah.

      I have known of the existence both of this ancestor (grandfather of Clara Saffer, my great-grandmother) and the cemetery for some time. Samuel (as he was called in England) was named on the marriage certificates of his children, and on his wife's death certificate in Manchester in 1923. My grandfather visited Brody in the early 1990s, just after the collapse of the Soviet Union, though the cemetery back then was in no condition to be visited- it was overlooked by an austere Soviet barracks! I am very grateful to all those involved in the Brody Cemetery Project for the massive effort it must have taken to record all the data; without them I could never have confirmed Shmuel's existence. Also without them, I would never have been able to see the beautiful detail, illustrated below, of my ancestor's fine grave.

Fine craftsmanship (see below for close-ups), not uncommon in the Brody cemetery,

Ritual Handwashing

Symbolic animals, possibly bird and lion.